Excellence makes my skin color secondary.

Judith Jamison

We do not grow absolutely, chronologically. We grow sometimes in one dimension, and not in another; unevenly. We grow partially. We are relative. We are mature in one realm, childish in another. The past, present, and future mingle and pull us backward, forward, or fix us in the present. We are made up of layers, cells, constellations.

~Anais Nin

***We’re going on a little blogging break and will return in 2014. Thanks for all of your support. Happy New Year!!!

Q. When you look back on your life, what is the legacy of Tina Turner?

A. Endurance. I endured hardship all the way. My legacy is that I stayed on course from the beginning to the end because I believed in something inside of me that told me it can get better or that you can make it better. And I wanted better. So my legacy is a person that strived for wanting it better and got it.

I want history to remember me not just as the first black woman to be elected to Congress, not as the first black woman to have made a bid for the presidency of the United States, but as a black woman who lived in the 20th century and dared to be herself.